Kona, March 2003

I just saw a commercial on television (between war coverage stories) about a car rental company that lets you pick your own car. Had I been asked which car I wanted when I arrived here in Kona, I would have asked for the car without cockroaches in it.

We putted around off the coast here for ten hours today, and didn’t see anything other than a bunch of breaching whales, and those didn’t even start “going off” (as they’ve been saying here) until 4pm. That means that we motored around aimlessly for eight hours before seeing anything interesting. Even though I’ve been (mostly) trying to avoid the sun, my face has started to peel a little. I’m going to look like a burn victim again.

I took an 8mm circular fish-eye lens with us on the boat just in case we had some time to kill, so there are some fun photos today. It seems silly to post “fun” photos when we are less than 48 hours away from war. Every morning, we leave the world of media influence for la-la-land on a boat. I feel some guilt for not taking a more active interest in what is going on. I’m not sure what to do about that guilt, though. Our administration is going to do whatever the hell it wants to do, regardless of what I think. It’s frustrating to feel so helpless. I certainly didn’t vote for him. [